Tom Harris

Author’s Note: This is the second half of Friday’s update. Sorry guys! Didn’t quite manage to write a bonus update like I hoped I would be able to do as an apology for splitting up this one update. I will, at some point, write a bonus update to make up for this when life settles down a little. I’ll keep you posted.

Cameron had complained before and often about the mandatory training sessions that came with being a superhero working for the SAA. It had less to do with the training itself, which she would have done on her own time anyway, and more with being forced to do it. She never had liked being forced into things.

But she didn’t hate it enough to not go. There were a lot of times in life where you just had to suck it up and deal.

Everyone that came to these were already there when Cameron arrived at the SAA’s big spacious gym. The sessions were mandatory but the team members with a little more clout could have them moved to more convenient times and days.

Ionic could have done that if she wanted, being the only one of them Agent Hayes trusted to not completely suck at leading their little team, but she liked to keep an eye on things, make sure they were all behaving properly and working hard.

Kate was here too, despite not being a field agent, practicing some hand to hand combat with Matt. He had been left out of the mission the other day against the Speed Fiends because he was a brute, not much else to him but strength and durability. Pure strength wasn’t so useful with guys too fast to engage in a regular fight. You wouldn’t guess Matt was the strongest out of them, he was tall and lean but nowhere close to matching the physique of a bodybuilder or even a football player.

Like Kate, Tom didn’t have to come but he always did. Kate did because she wanted to be a field agent more than anything but had failed the necessary examinations. It didn’t actually matter if she passed, her mom couldn’t stand the thought of her precious daughter in danger and the life of an active superhero was nothing but danger. Letting Kate work at the SAA in a non-combat role had been a compromise they came to after a lot of arguments, from what Kate told her.

It was different for Tom. He was dangerous. He didn’t have complete control over his abilities and when those abilities involved creating fire people – including his parents – got scared. Some incident he caused in the past didn’t help in quelling their fears. They sent him here so he could learn more control. It was one of the functions the SAA served beyond stopping superhuman crime.

He was in the special room they had for them to use their powers in without worrying about the damage that might be caused. The walls of the room could be set to transparent so everyone else could watch. Today it was. Tom was standing on one side of the room, two gigantic pillars of flame came out of his hands. The room was sealed so they didn’t have to worry about smoke or anything else escaping.

Ionic was in a corner by herself hitting a wooden dummy with a bunch of poles sticking out of it with her bare hands.

Everyone wore normal workout clothes, except Tom who wore a black fireproof jumpsuit. They didn’t wear costumes unless it was one of those special days where they did hardcore sparring with each other.

All teenage members. Cameron didn’t blame the adults for not wanting to hang out with them. She wouldn’t either if she were them.

Cameron went to the collection of treadmills they had in the corner.

Instructors came by once every two weeks to teach them martial arts or whatever they wanted. Matt, for example, liked to learn about different sword fighting styles. The rest of the training sessions were dedicated to making sure they stayed in tip top shape and practice what they learned from the instructors.

It wasn’t super useful, most of the time. She learned all about the proper way to fight from experience and what Creed taught her.

Her feet pounding on the treadmill, music playing from her headphones, Cameron got an idea.

The UltimateTech lab she had Ian destroy had to have had someone who was in contact with the Automatons. There was probably only one or two in the know, aware they had criminals working for them, to keep things as secure as they could. She hadn’t given it much thought at the time. Having Ian attack them too had been a whim, to send the Automatons a message that just hitting one of their bases wouldn’t have sent. Attacking both told them that there was someone out there with a grudge that knew a great deal about them and their business. Someone out there that knew what they were doing, someone with a plan.

That was what she told Ian to tell them anyway, if the Automatons ever came to question him.

The Automatons probably didn’t consider the two attacks much of a threat.

If the attacks were planned by someone with a reputation…

Someone the Automatons might actually be afraid of, that might cause them to act and if they acted, so would Creed’s organization.

She sat slumped in a chair pushed against the wall, staring at the door Agent Brown had disappeared into ten minutes ago. Definitely more than the moment she said it would take. The many games she had downloaded on her personal phone weren’t entertaining enough to keep her attention when she was this tired. Last night was one of those nights where sleep was practically impossible.

“Sorry for making you wait, hopefully this will make up for it,” Agent Brown said, finally emerging from the room with two cups of coffee in her hands, handing one to Cameron. She took a sip, testing to see how hot it was, and was pleasantly surprised to find it almost the perfect level of warmth. “They’re going to let us in, soon. They need to finish a few things up.”

“Okay, so clarify something for me while we wait. Why am I even here?” Cameron gestured to the cramped hallway they were waiting in. “Visiting a facilities for crazy powers isn’t on my bucket list.”

Agent Brown smiled indulgently. “I told you last night, remember? After I caught you staying out past your curfew. You could call this a punishment, I suppose.”

“Getting to miss school is a punishment? I think we have very different definitions of punishment. Unless you’re planning on putting me here, because I’m already getting the creeps from the cheery flower wallpaper.”

“Well, maybe warning is the better word to use here. We’re not tracking you anymore but we will take that freedom away if you continue to push it.” She paused to drink some of her own coffee. “The warning is a bonus, the real reason I wanted you to come with me is because I wanted you to meet Tom.”

“He lives here?”

“Used to, now he lives at the SAA building in Avocet, like yourself. He’s been gone for a couple of weeks, he was required to come back to do some tests, so they’re certain he’s safe to be out in the world. He is, and that’s why we traveled all the way here to pick him up and bring him back with us.”

“And you want me to meet him because…?”

“I think you two might get along,” Brown admitted. “You’re both around the same age and I saw you reading that book, the one with the bar of soap on the cover, I’ve seen him reading it too. People with similar taste in literature tend to get along, so they say anyway.”

Cameron drank more of her coffee. “Are you sure it’s a good idea to introduce this possibly psychotic teenage boy to a convicted criminal?”

Agent Brown laughed, and laughed and laughed. Cameron wondered if she’d pass out. Finally, she got herself under control. “Tom is a lot of things, Cameron but psychotic is the last word I’d ever use to describe him. He wasn’t sent here because he’s unhinged or violent, Tom just can’t control his powers very well and with a power like his, that’s very dangerous to the people around him.”

Most powers had trouble learning to control their abilities at first, when Cameron got hers she would accidentally teleport random objects into new locations. It was a huge pain in the ass to find where she moved her stuff. “But he’s got it handled now?”

“Of course, I’ve been helping him, he’s made a lot of progress since we first met. It won’t be long before he’ll be capable of having a normal of a life as he wants.”

The door opened enough for a nurse to poke her head out and smile politely at them. “Sorry about the wait, Agent Brown. You can come in, now.” They both got up from their seats as the nurse pushed the door all the way open. “Follow me, I’ll show you where he is.” They did, entering the room – a small office between the waiting room and another hallway – and passing it go walk down the hall. All the walls had the same pastel green paint with little flowers in random places. The doors were identical too except for the number on each one. They stopped in front of the one marked B15. The nurse knocked on the door, the sounding echoing down the hall.

A teenage boy came out after the third knock. He was only a few inches taller than her, his dirty blond hair cut short, and his green eyes brightened when he smiled at Agent Brown.

“I assume you can take it from here?” the nurse asked Brown.

“Yes, thank you,” she said. The nurse left, going further down the long hallway, disappearing when she reached the end and turned right. “Tom, this is Cameron Pierce. Cameron, this is Tom Harris.”

He extended his hand, still smiling. “Hi, it’s nice to meet you.”

She shook it. “Likewise.” His hand was unusually warm, as if he held it against a heating vent for several minutes.

“Come on, let’s go. Our ride is waiting for us,” Agent Brown said, before the silence that ensued could get awkward. Cameron and Agent Brown had ridden an inventor made ship to get here. There wasn’t actually a pilot, the ship drove itself once someone inputted the coordinates. They walked back to where they just came from.

“So, what were you doing in there?” Cameron asked.

He shrugged. “Just having me test out my powers, see how well I control it, check what my power level is. That kind of stuff.”

Ten years after the government officially acknowledged the existence of superhumans, an inventor came forward with a device that could detect the energy surrounding all superhumans. Power levels were based around the amount of energy around a superhuman. The device wasn’t perfect, though, there had been some cases of superhumans not being detected by the device at all. Creed told her it was possible to learn how to conceal this energy to bypass the detectors, it was how he managed to keep his identity hidden despite interacting with the SAA often.

“I don’t mind, really,” Tom said, shoving his hands into the pockets of his jeans. “Thirteen. I’m a level thirteen.”

Cameron whistled, impressed. Thirteen was considered to be very high, it was estimated that in twenty years, thirteen would be the average power level for superhumans. What a scary thought. “I’m only seven myself.”